I've noticed that, too -- tons of them in the beds, lawn, everywhere. More than I've noticed in previous years. I'm trying to decide whether it's worth cultivating lightly to uproot them, or whether it makes more sense to just bury them under an extra-thick layer of mulch. All somewhat ironic since I just paid good money at the Conservation District for a nice red maple! ;)

I have lots too..bout the only thing growing!

I live almost directly on the ocean and the neighbor's property has loads of a European immigrant that loves the ocean - Sycamore maple (Acer pseudoplatanus). It's not a particularly worthy maple since the autumn leaves are brown or dingy yellow and there's nothing otherwise noteworthy about it.

On top of that it drops TONS of seeds that lie dormant all winter and explode into life right now.

What a weed! What a pain!

...Me too.

we have the same tree/problem york rose does.
No more seedlings than usual, there are always a ton :(

I have a sugar maple in the front yard, a red maple in the side yard, and two big pin oaks in the backyard. I always have tons of seedlings, and this year is no exception. The ones in the lawn will be beheaded by the tractor, which is an excellent way of slaughtering them by the thousands, but the ones in the garden beds must be ripped out by hand.

I have tons and not just maples! I am pulling every day. They come up pretty easily.

Just for the heck of it, in the fall I'm going to re-apply cornmeal gluten in the area that always gets seeded by maples. I'll be curious as to whether the germination is reduced. HOwever, since the seed rate seems to vary by year, I won't really know if its the preemergent control or less seed production by the maples, will I?
Even more basic, I don't know if preemergent herbicides (organic or not) work on a tough seed like maples'.

Maybe I won't waste my money or time, after all.

Marie

I always pull what seems like thousands of Norway maple seedlings every spring, and the ones I miss grow into tiny trees that won't die unless I dig them out. They are everywhere!

I'm also pulling baby American elms, I have a huge one that drops so many seeds that it looks like it's snowing right now. I literally sweep the seeds out of the garden. But hundreds will escape and grow all over next year... I think I have more tree weeds than dandelions!

I'm worried........seriously. We have THOUSANDS and thousands! I was wondering if it was just us! I think it must have been the high winds we had in January?? Our woods are full of them, wetlands, gardens, lawn......The mower will take care of the lawn ones but my back is SORE from handpulling all the others.....arrrgh!

Oh My Goodness...I thought it was just us! There are so many. I was trying to think what we did differently last fall but now that I see that the situation is ubiquitous I'm guessing that it's either some sort of cyclical maple thing or just something about the climate conditions last fall and this spring. Weird, isn't it?

I'm hoping mowing the lawn will undermine most of them. That and pulling them out of the beds.

Patty

I am glad someone made a thread about this, because I have thousands of them and it is so strange. Every day there seem to be dozens and dozens of new ones where I just weeded.

I have literally thousands, too! I've never had this many EVER! I do little spurts of 100 at a time, and I am still feeling overwhelmed. I'm trying to get them all before the cicadas come out...UG!

The previous owner planted Norway Maples - ugh, what a scourge! They are a beautiful, rugged tree but they are not native and very invasive - they are on the Prohibited Plant list in our state.

They seemed to go crazy this year. Thousands and thousands of samaras! Now there are seedlings popping up everywhere.

I have a long-term plan to get rid of them, which includes girdling and cutting them down, but I guess I'll be pulling up zillions of seedlings too...:(

Yes, our's are Norways....we have a gorgeous 100 yr old monster in the back and of course, all her offspring here and there. We HAVE taken down about a dozen of the smaller ones trying to get control but ??? I think that incredibly warm Dec followed by the high winds in the beginning of the year really scattered "live ones" around! It stinks...especially in our woods.

We suddenly noticed hundreds of little seedlings of some kind popping up all over our yard. The yard is dominated by a lone Silver Maple tree which produced a bumper crop of helicopters this season, so I'm thinking what we have is a whole lot of little Silver Maples.

Can anyone make a positive ID on a seelding for me before my daughter starts trying to relocate and plant them? I posted two photos at http://what-is-this.wizardom.com with a Contact Form. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Here is a link that might be useful: What is this seedling?

I have no idea whether there's any connection, but do have to wonder: last fall we had NO acorns on the oak trees. Is the abundance of maple seedlings now some kind of weird karmic balance?!

That looks like a maple seedling to me, so if you've got a silver maple that's probably what it is, rookie_tree_hunter.

There's also a forum here called "name that plant" which has worked really well for me in the past. That or the trees forum might have an expert who can give you a positive id. On the other hand, I'd suggest you pull them all since it's a lot easier now than it will be next year when they've got their "anchors" fully developed.

I know this is an old thread, but I came across it today because my lawn is covered in thousands of tiny maple tree sprouts. I have a large lawn (about 1.5 acres), and I am wondering if I were to "quarantine off" a section of the lawn far from the house to not be mowed, what is the chance that any of the maple seedlings would survive? This seems unlikely, but my wife I thought it would be pretty cool to allow a section to become forested with these maple trees. Does anyone have a ranging guess as to how many might survive in a 100' x 75' section if the ground is covered with trees? I live in northeast TN. Thank you for any wisdom/thoughts!

I don't know anything about gardening in northeast TN, but here in southeast MA maple seedlings grow quite happily and become tall trees if you turn your back on them.

Do you know what kind of maples they are? In any case, you may need to thin them out so they don't compete, but I'm guessing you can have a fine maple forest with little effort. After all, most of us live in what used to be forest land that has been cleared, and the forest is just itching to come back.

Claire

Preston Visser: This happened to my parents by accident in the border between their property and the neighbor's, where the landscapers weren't clear on the exact border and erred on the side of caution. If you get a decent amount of rainfall this year and some weed (eg. Oriental Bittersweet or buckthorn) doesn't out compete them, A LOT of those maple seedlings will survive.

You will end up with densely packed little trees. I recommend you determine what kind of maples you have. After a couple years, thin out the undesirable species, ones that don't have good Fall color and ones that have multiple leaders.

My parents lost some trees and have some volunteer maple seedlings. I'm trying to determine which ones are sugar maple and which ones are Norway Maple, so I know which ones to preserve.

I had a sugar maple installed two summers ago, and yes this year, I'm yanking up thousands of seedlings out of my beds.

Edlincoln, tear the leaves. If the sap is milky, even a small amount, it's for sure Norway. Sugar Maple has clear sap only.

In past years the deer took care of the abundant maple seedlings.and proceeded to produce an abundant crop of deer -- triplets!

Beautiful tree! If you don't get an ID here, people on the Trees Forum will certainly know.

Claire

The mama tree looks to be a silver maple (Acer saccharinum), often planted in yards since it grows rather quickly. Not a great yard tree however since it often gets far too large and then starts dropping branches, particularly if there's heavy snow or ice. It's a wonderful tree, just not usually well-placed, so I'd only let your seedlings grow if they are well away from the house. At present the saplings look about half way between red maples and silver maples and you might have either in the area.